Ian Darke will be the lead broadcaster for ESPN and is scheduled to broadcast the World Cup opener between Brazil and Croatia in Sao Paulo, England’s opener against Italy in Manaus, and the U.S. Men’s National Team opener against Ghana in Natal. Darke will re-unite at ESPN with Steve McManaman for the Brazil and England games and Darke will work alongside former USMNT forward Taylor Twellman for the USA match.

In addition to Darke, veteran broadcasters Jon Champion, Adrian Healey, Daniel Mann, and Derek Rae have all been assigned to multiple games during the first week of the World Cup. Fernando Palomo and Alejandro Moreno have been assigned to broadcast Mexico’s opener against Cameroon.

Other TV analysts for the first round include Efan Ekoku, Kasey Keller, Roberto Martinez, and Stewart Robson.

The broadcaster pairings also included the coverage on ESPN Radio, which will be lead by veteran play-by-play man J.P. Dellacamera. Dellacamera will work alongside Tommy Smyth, while Ross Dyer will also handle play-by-play Mark Donaldson. Radio analysts include Shep Messing, Janusz Michallik, Paul Mariner, and Shaka Hislop.

Here’s a look at ESPN’s broadcaster pairings for the first week of the tournament:

totally disagree. love twellman. the footy version of madden. loves the sport. is knowledgeable, opinionated. even if i disagree that is exactly what i want. not some newt like dellacamera who doesn’t understand the game and talks as if lodged by a 2×4.

I know people despise Twellman. But he is so much better than John Harkes. That guy provided absolutely nothing to a broadcast. As least Twellman can provide insight at times that is actually coherent and relevant.

Don’t know why you guys are so down on Harkes; but I suppose I simply have not watched more than a couple matches that he covered. I was recently re-watching the 3-0 victory over Egypt in the ’09 Confed. Cup and was impressed by Harkes’s early and accurate observations that Dempsey was a real liability in the midfield (he was originally lined up on the right wing, occasionally switching with Donovan on the left). Wasn’t getting involved in the offense well, passing was horrid and wasn’t tracking back at all. But then gets shifted forward late in the match (when Feilhaber subbed on for Altidore) and within two minutes scored the decisive third goal (as you recall they advanced over Italy on total goals). I thought Harkes added to the understanding of the game in this case. It was surely something Bob Bradley was saying to himself at the same time.

Meh. Sounds nice but Dempsey seemed most effective up top as a late change — precisely how he was used — and if you pulled him and Landon up from mid who was going to play there? The basic problem was they were both the strong forward options and the strong wing options and they couldn’t be both places at the same time.

You have to remember Holden was just back from injury, Torres was this milquetoast connecting player not even in the running anymore, Beasley wasn’t playing much and had downgraded to supporting role, etc.

Harkes would say “going forward” about 100 times per broadcast. I understand its an acceptable term to use when describing defensive players joining the attack, but he used it to the point where it was a verbal crutch.

I like Taylor Twellman as part of a studio panel but loathe him as a color guy. Very interesting tht he’s calling non US games. I never seen him make an intelligent comment about anything not having to do with the USMNT or MLS. Colombia and Greece should make for interesting color commentary I not else, for the enjoyment of watching Twellman say Papastadopolous

Suddenly Bob Neal and Mick Luckhurst on TNT (commercials and all) at Italia ’90 popped into my head. Man that US team came close to drawing with Italy in Rome. Our young mostly amateur side was completely overmatched and we made them wear rancid kits.

I will be the first to say I am not a Taylor Twellman guy but he is not nearly as bad as people make him out to be. This was not his original profession and it takes time to grow into being a good color guy. He knows the game… he needs to work on his grudge holding though… he hates on Eddie Johnson with a passion…

Once I made a silly “Taylor Twellman is so lame” comment on Twitter under the hashtag for whatever USMNT game was on that day (not those exact words, but that was the substance, and maturity level, of my tweet). He apparently saw the tweet a few days later, and tweeted a response with self-deprecating humor. He also asked what I didn’t like about his work. Hard to judge in 140 char, of course, but he sounded sincerely interested in my opinion, and not defensively so.

I became an instant fan. I agree with Andy in ATL that Twellman has room for improvement, and I still don’t want to watch him call Galaxy games, but he’s done a good job over the past year calling USMNT games.

Compare his style as a player to the person being critiqued. Twellman was the slower hustling Wondo of his day who had technical limits but was a lunchpail guy who did the intangible things and made goals from nothing (but was reckless with is body and retired from concussions). EJ is an interesting player with athletic ability an intermittent production who drives lunchpail types nuts because he is sloppy and lazy but has so many naturally valuable traits.

Still an upgrade over the 1994 world cup when ABC used baseball announcer Al Trautwig for the Belgium-Holland game and he had the players for the two teams mixed up for the entire first half. In other words, if #7 for Holland touched the ball, he called the guy the name of #7 for Belgium. Highly entertaining but also highly embarrassing.

Oh so right Tim H. John Harkes was pathetic. Terrible delivery and did not stay focused on match. Had a bad habit of wanting to analyse overall status of USMNT program after every misplayed pass or defensive breakdown.

US soccer broadcasting has at least achieved this basic upgrade. In some prior tournaments I would watch Spanish on purpose to avoid being annoyed out of my mind. I understood enough to get occasional bits of commentary. Say what you will but when I set the 2014 games to record, I generally went with English except Mexico because it’s up to a tolerable level. That’s progress.

Most of these commentators are solid and will be enjoyable, but personally I’d love to see some Bein guys do some games. Ross Dyer is a GREAT commentator and I think would be perfect for some televised games.

I am a TFC fan and I was worried the first time I watched a Toronto New England game with Twellman as colour commentator. He was fantastic…knows the game, knew the players for both teams and truly avoided sounding like a homer.
Now the best American commentator, imho, is Tim Howard. On the NBC broadcast of Liverpool – Chelsea he was fantastic. Hope he goes into broadcasting…
Of course Darke and McManaman are solid gold….